Plantations

The forest fires are back. In East Kalimantan, the worst hit area so far, tens of thousands of hectares are burning out of control. The fires -- mostly deliberately set by big business -- and the continuing effects of the drought are bringing famine and dispossession to local communities whose once rich resources have been plundered and destroyed.

1997 will be remembered as a year when greed and folly led to international pollution on an unprecedented scale. Indonesia's fires, burning in some places since June, have devastated vast swathes of forests and farmland and have endangered the health of tens of millions of people across at least six countries.

This selective chronology, compiled mainly from press reports, follows the development of the 1997 fires, documents the government response and attempts to gives some indication of its impact on the population.